On Sun, 01 Feb 2004 20:33:37 +0100, "Peter Ruest" <pruest@mail-
ms.sunrise.ch> said:
>
> Rich Blinne wrote:
> > On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 14:19:01 -0500, "Ted Davis"
> > <TDavis@messiah.edu> said:
> > > Let me offer a "second opinion," relative to your friend using ID
> > > arguments.
> > >
> > > I think that the ID movement is making some valid points about
> > > modern science, as follows.
> >
> > I agree. I would like to see the ID movement focus on the anthropic
> > principle more rather than on disproving evolution. When doing this
> > they need to avoid the same fallacious statistical methods they apply
> > to evolution, though. This would also keep people like Hugh Ross in
> > their area of expertise. Some recent developments last year that
> > would make for strenghtening the anthropic principle (no pun
> > intended)include:
> >
> > 1. WAP satellite showing the universe is flat. One of the arguments
> > against the Strong Anthropic Principle was oscillating universes.
> > A flat universe does not allow for that.
> >
> >2. Strong bounds on Lorenz Invariance violations. This hampers some
> > of the multi-dimensional, multiple-Universe, string theories.
>
> This sounds very interesting! Could you enlarge a little about these
> two points? Are there any articles in the primary literature which can
> be understood by a simple biochemist - but who is interested in
> cosmology and the anthropic principle?

There are two major forms of the Anthropic Principle, strong and weak.
The Strong Anthropic principle argues that the Universe is too improbable
to produce intelligent life and thus needs to be "fine-tuned". The Weak
Anthropic Principle responds with the multiple universes models. Any one
Universe is improbable for intelligent life but the aggregate possibility
is enough to account for this Universe. This is usually done by either
invoking multiple dimensions or the oscillating Big Bang. Both of
these possibilities took hits last year.

The multiple dimension theory got hit by experiments testing out so-
called Lorentz Invariance. Some web sites of interest:

Scientists say Albert Einstein's principle of the constancy of the speed
of light holds up under extremely tight scrutiny, a finding that *rules
out certain theories predicting extra dimensions* and a "frothy" fabric
of space. [emphasis mine]

*Some models with large extra dimensions [21], [22] are ruled out* by the
exis- tence of absorption in the very high energy spectra of nearby BL
Lac objects. The fact that more distant brighter sources are not seen can
also be taken as indirect evidence of intergalactic absorption by pair
production interactions [2]. The constraints based on analysis of the
Crab Nebula Ã£-ray spectrum, discussed in the previous section, imply that
the quantum gravity scale is or- ders of magnitude above the Planck mass
scale. This indicates that the class of models considered here with
linear Planck scale suppressed terms in the dispersion relations cannot
be reflective of physics at the Planck scale. Models such as loop quantum
gravity with a preferred inertial frame are ruled out by this line of
reasoning. Alternative models to consider might be models with quartic
momentum terms with M2QG supression in the dispersion relations, Lorentz
invariant quantum gravity models, or really new Planck scale physics such
as string theory, which preserves Lorentz invariance. [emphasis mine]

The other possibility was the oscillating universe. The WMAP satellite
(sorry for my typo on the previous post) was determine -- among other
things -- whether the universe is open, closed, or, flat.
If it is closed the Big Bang is followed by the Big Crunch. Thus, the
Universe will be as
the shampoo bottle says: lather, rinse, repeat. This is tailor-made for
Weak Anthropic Principle. WMAP came back with the answer, flat. See
http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_mm/mr_content.html. There will be no Big
Crunch.

The multiple universe theories of WAP are converging on one Universe. If
this keeps up, the proponents of the Weak Anthropic Principle will have
to go back and deal with the full force of the Strong Anthropic Principle
and the implied Intelligent Design.
Received on Sun Feb 1 23:59:53 2004